Step Toward Universal Computing

Step Toward Universal Computing reports on a new "near-universal emulator that allows software developed for one platform to run on any other, with almost no performance hit":

Transitive Corp. of Los Gatos, California, claims its QuickTransit software allows applications to run 'transparently' on multiple hardware platforms, including Macs, PCs, and numerous servers and mainframes.

Yeah, but how does it perform?

In demonstrations to press and analysts, the company has shown a graphically demanding game — a Linux version of Quake III — running on an Apple PowerBook.

This isn't entirely new:

One of the key breakthroughs is an "intermediate representation," a kind of lingua franca that gives the software the flexibility to translate from one platform to another.

Unlike most other emulators, QuickTransit translates blocks of code rather than a line at a time. In addition, it identifies and stores the most commonly executed code.

"It's like a translator versus an interpreter," said lead engineer Frank Weidel. "Instead of working on every chunk of code, QuickTransit translates a sentence, or a paragraph, at a time. That's how we get the performance."